


To Crush the Catnip Leaves for Tea

by cinnamonsnaps



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alternate Universe - No Sburb/Sgrub Sessions, Blood, Dysfunctional Family, F/M, Fluff, High School, Homicide, Humanstuck
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-08-22
Updated: 2014-01-28
Packaged: 2017-12-24 08:19:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 5
Words: 7,664
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/937724
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cinnamonsnaps/pseuds/cinnamonsnaps
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>12 days were all that were needed to change Karkat's life, irrevocably, permanently, hopelessly.<br/>Day twelve is a tragedy.<br/>Day one is a shy girl who knocks him down in the school corridor.</p><p>From his mysterious online confidante, to his friends still struggling with ghosts of their own, he must struggle to find out what, exactly, is brewing in the porcelain kettle that is the next 12 days.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Day Twelve - The Prologue

_Day 12 - 0 days to incident._

A gap of light hits your eye, a slice let in by the narrow space between the closet door and the carpet.  
Outside, linoleum.  
Inside, cleaning supplies and brain numbing fear.  
Perhaps shutting yourself into a 3 foot square space wasn't the greatest of ideas - except nobody has great ideas when they are consumed by fear, bared down to their instinct and locked in overdrive.  
A shadow passes across the gap and you freeze.  
Oh god oh fuck oh god oh fuck -  
You don't even breath. The shadow passes. You wait four minutes before you allow yourself to fill your lungs.  
Your heart lurches as you think of all your friends - oh god you've been so selfish - and you wonder if it's safe to just open your phone and check, check if there are any calls or texts -  
 _any last messages -_  
oh god Nepeta. She had looked so. So resolute.  
I hope she's ok please don't be dead don't go after him don't be stupid _please_ -  
Boots, stomping, heavy breathing, shuffling sounds and human sounds and you panic, he's back, he's crazy, he's going to _kill you stone dead without so much as a blink of an eye oh help please god help_  
"There's no one else here!" a low voice yells and it's not _him_ , and you nearly cry out with relief.  
"Copy - suspect is currently unapprehended -"  
Oh thank god they're the police you've never been so grateful to the boys in blue in your life because police have motherfucking _guns_ -  
"I'm in here!" you yell, frantically moving the brooms and buckets so you could reach the door handle. "I'm in here and fuck! Fuck I'm alive!"  
The door opens and you're pulled into the soft winter light corridor by your shirt, hands motioning you to be quiet by a middle aged police officer. You vaguely notice the red specks caused by shaving on his chin, and the few greys in his hair. It's funny what's coming into focus and what isn't. The rest of the corridor - hell, the rest of the school, Gamzee, even the cupboard you just fell out of - could be a million miles away. All you can think about right now is how ethereal the grey sunlight filtering through the clouds is. How grey everything is.  
"You gotta be quiet son. We still need to find him."  
Your feet are wet. They leave red bloodprints when you take a few steps forward.  
You're aware you should be disturbed but you aren't.  
Maybe you'll find the time to be horrified later.  
Faintly - so faintly, and far away, with the same deceptive sense of distance like a car crash in the next street or a hoover in the apartment above - a single honk sounds.  
Your eyes widen, hands scrabbling on his sleeves.  
He grabs his gun and muffles his radio, face grim.  
Your name is Karkat Vantas and you chose the wrong day to come into school.


	2. Day One - 12 Days to Incident

_Day 1 - 12 days to incident._  
File #69 Witness: Full Name KARKAT VANTAS  
ID 18126969 

DEAR FUCKING DIARY  
HERE WE GO AGAIN. I DON'T KNOW WHY THE FUCK I LET MYSELF BE PULLED INTO THESE BULLSHIT COUNCELLING SESSIONS TO DO THESE STUPID ACTIVITIES. THE NEXT TIME SOME SWEATY OBESE MID-LIFE CRISIS COUNCELLOR ACCOSTS ME WITH A PEN AND NOTEBOOK AND TELLS ME TO EXAMINE MY FEELINGS I AM LITERALLY GOING TO SHOVE IT DOWN THEIR GREASY THROAT AND TELL THEM TO SUCK ON IT, IN THE HOPES THEY ACTUALLY GAIN SOME HEALTHY NONSATURATED FUCKING NUTRIENTS. I ALREADY KNOW HOW I FEEL - AND WHAT I FEEL IS THAT MY ENTIRE SCHOOL IS FUCKING CRAZY AND I'M GOING CRAZY JUST BEING HERE. I AM LITERALLY ABSORBING THE CRAZINESS VIA OSMOSIS AND BY THE END OF THE WEEK, WHEN ANYONE ASKS "OH, WHERE THE FUCK'S KARKAT" (WHICH THEY WON'T BECAUSE NOBODY FUCKING WANTS TO KNOW WHERE KARKAT IS) THEY'LL FIND ME UPSIDE DOWN ON THE MONKEY BARS SCREAMING ABOUT HOW THE UNIVERSE IS A FROG OR SOMETHING EQUALLY AS INANE AND BRAIN NUMBINGLY STUPID.  
I DON'T UNDERSTAND WHY I NEED TO COME TO THIS STUPID "CORRECTIVE" SCHOOL ANYWAY. THERE'S **NOTHING FUCKING WRONG WITH ME.**  
WHAT DO THEY EXPECT WILL HAPPEN? JUST BECAUSE WE GO TO "ALTERNATE" EDUCATION - WHAT DOES THAT MAKE US, ALTERNIANS? NO, THAT SOUNDS STUPID - DOES THAT MEAN THE WORLD WILL TREAT US MORE KINDLY? I CALL BULLSHIT. DOES IT MEAN WE WILL GRADUALLY LEARN HOW TO STANDARDISE OURSELVES IN ORDER TO APPEAL TO THE SOCIAL NORM?  
IN THIS FUCKING PLACE?  
I'M SURPRISED IT HASN'T BEEN RECLASSIFIED AS AN ASYLUM YET.  
AT LEAST NO ONE READS THIS. IT'S BAD ENOUGH THEY TAKE OUR SHOELACES AWAY. THEY CONFISCATED MY PENCIL SHARPENER YESTERDAY. MY *PENCIL SHARPENER*. IT WAS EXPENSIVE AS FUCK AS WELL.  
TEREZI GOT IT ME. IT WAS A LITTLE CRAB WITH CLAWS.  
I MISS TEREZI.  
NO SHUT UP SHUT UP WE ARE NOT GOING THERE - PAST ME HAS SPENT LONG ENOUGH WHINING OVER THAT SPIKY MUFFMUNCHER AS IT IS.  
I'M JUST. I'M JUST SICK OF THIS SCHOOL NOW. I'M SICK OF ALL THE CRAZIES AND THE DRUG ADDICTS AND THE BROKEN-HOMERS. I DON'T BELONG HERE.  
OH FUCK I'VE STARTED DOING IT.  
I'VE STARTED ~~EXAMINING MY FEELINGS.~~  
THAT'S IT I'M DONE. AU REVOIR. GOODBYE. FUCK OFF.  
CG

You stuff the notebook back in your bag to fester with the rest of your crap. The counsellor gives you an approving look. It's not fair to call her "some sweaty obese mid-life crisis", not really. She's kind of pretty in a strange, pale way - her deep purple lipstick looks almost black and her blonde hair is almost white, . Really, the worst thing about her was the way she wormed into your head. And stayed there.  
"Are you not going to share your diary with me?"  
"No."  
"I wasn't expecting any different. As long as you feel you are making progress, then it isn't too important I intrude upon your privacy."  
"Um... thanks I guess?"  
"I'm not here to fight you. I know you're probably sick of being nannied by us. Just remember, we aren't your enemies."  
"Um. Right." You roll your eyes and slump out your chair, making a quick exit for the door. Thank god that's over for today.  
In the corridor, you're swept along by the flow of students - a consequence of timing your exit with lunch time - and you can't be bothered to fight it, not today.  
You can't be bothered to fight it until it fights back, that is.  
"Watch the fuck where you're going!" you yell irately as you collide with somebody, with enough force to make your teeth slam together.  
"Ooops! I'm - I'm sorry-!"  
You look at your aggressor. Both of you have ended up sitting heavily on the floor and the crowd is parting around like _don't say the red sea don't say the red sea_ the Red Sea.  
You're just too stunned to come up with anything less clichéd right now.  
The girl sprawled opposite you is tiny and looking at you fearfully with wide eyes, dark short hair tumbling carelessly out of a blue knitted hat.  
"Ooops!" she gasps again. "Are you ok?!"  
"Fucking dandy," you scowl. You think you're concussed.  
Her eyes widen even more and she scrambles onto her feet, bouncing over to offer you a hand.  
You smack her hand away and grudgingly lift yourself up, but she doesn't seem to take offense. She just keeps... looking at you.  
"You left your bag on the floor," you add once you're on your feet, pointing to where a canvas bagpack is being kicked around by the passing students.  
Her head jerks around with surprise, her steady gaze finally broken, and she lets out a squeak.  
"My paint tubes!"  
You roll your eyes and turn around. Normally you would bite the fucker's head off who managed to be so idiotic as to knock you over, but today you're just not feeling it.  
Maybe it's because she looks so harmless and small.  
Maybe it's because you aren't a _complete_ tool who yells mindlessly at girls over a simple accident.  
You cast a glance over your shoulder to check no one decided to play piggy in the middle with her stuff (it's happened to you and they were laughing so hard until you punched them even harder in the groin).  
She's slung her bag over her shoulder and stands in the centre of the crowd, still looking at you with those disconcertingly unwavering eyes. Olive green, you notice.  
You shiver a little and keep on walking. This school is full of weirdos. Guess she isn't an exception.

The lunch line is long and life threatening.  
The food is cheap and supposed to be healthy.  
Your classmates are imbeciles and your friends are nutcases.  
You wonder if you take a perverse pleasure in making friends with what you can only describe as the unholiest group of emotion-sucking black holes of idiotic fucktardedness, or whether some based god is laughing at you while pulling the selfsame strings that bind you to them.  
You are binded. Whether you like it or not.  
The first thing you see as you approach the table where you usually end up sitting is Tavros's wheelchair. It's not like you can miss the fucking thing, with its shiny wheels the size of planet fucking Jupiter. You've had them over your foot multiple times. You swear they left permanent welts.  
Besides Tavros sits one of the only decent human beings in the school, a girl you met recently called Kanaya. You're pretty sure she's a lesbian but you don't give a flying fuck. Other people do, however, which is why she finds herself sitting with you guys on the loser table.  
You feel so sorry for her. She's a classy lady, reduced to sharing her lunch breaks with both an emotional cripple and an actual one.  
She merely nods as a greeting, lost in her thoughts. You half-nod back at her but she doesn't see.  
"Hi," Tavros greets you nervously.  
You stare at his face.  
"Someone drew a dick on your face."  
"What?"  
"In pen. On your face. How did you not notice." You pull out your phone and let him look in the reflection.  
"How the? But I, I thought they said it was a pencil, she said it was a pencil -"  
"Why the fuck were you letting anyone near your face with a sharp pointed instrument, let alone a pencil?"  
"They were talking about magic tricks, in Biology I mean, and Vriska was showing me a trick where you draw on your cheek with a pencil and it can control your hand," and at this he looked at his fingers, twiddling them nervously, "but I guess it wasn't a magic trick at all, just a way of drawing dicks on my face, yet again."  
Kanaya seems to break out of her reverie.  
"Why were you talking about magic tricks in Biology? That seems a rather odd topic of discussion."  
"We had Mr Egbert teaching us - that, uh, supply teacher."  
Oh. Him.  
"The one who puts Ghostbusters references on his slideshows and wears horrible matching ties and socks?" She visibly shudders.  
"Yeahhhh. He was showing us card tricks today. We were supposed to be learning about mitosis."  
He's such a huge bloody dork and everybody seems to love him and gush endlessly about how amazing his lessons are.  
How the fuck does he do it, you think. How can he waltz into a classroom, beam that stupid fucking dorky smile that he should've grown out of fifteen years ago and suddenly have the class lapping out of his hand? You hate him so much.  
Is it his infuriating fixation with being "your friendteacher rather than your enemaestro" (although he is worthy enough of your hate with those terrible wordjams)? Is it the fact he is 100% prime bully-able material but he never gets jack shit off anyone?  
Or is it that he only looks about three years older than you and yet he gets to pull this condescending authority crap over you?  
God you hate condescension. You're not some mutant they have to worry and nag and look after (as far as they know, you internally curse).  
You notice Kanaya give you a small smile over the table and you look down. It makes you feel a little better though.


	3. Day Two - 11 Days To Incident

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> in which nothing much happens.  
> the chapters get way way longer, i guarantee.

_Day Two: 11 Days to Incident_

_"[...] eyewitnesses say there was little unusual behaviour leading up to the event, with the suspect being noticied only for his make up and 'speaking quirk'... [he] was seen around the institute regularly with key suspect 18126969 [...]" - **Police report from incident.**_

You shiver and hug your arms.   
"Why. The fuck. Are we sitting up here?"  
The boy next to you grins and reaches into his blazer. "Gotta go somewhere the teachers aren't also." He pulls out a roll up fag, quickly licking and sticking the paper and tobacco with the ease of a practised smoker.  
You look at it uncomfortably. "They really kill people, you know. It's not just a shitty conspiracy."  
He shrugs. "Keeps my hands occupied some motherfucking way, bro. If you're all up and worried about me-"  
You glare at him, something that many people in your school wouldn't dare to do. Gamzee is intimidating, with his shocking facepaint standing out against his dark skin, and his unruly black curls. He'd be a rather attractive boy if he just took care of himself, you find yourself thinking. People wouldn't be scared of him like they are now.  
"-I'm not worried about you! You can go and die in a hole for all I care. It's just the secondhand smoke is thick enough to give me lung cancer in thirty seconds flat."  
He looks at the cigarette in his hands mournfully, and takes a long drag before extinguishing it in the grass.  
"Sorry Karbro. Didn't realise the smoke was getting up in your grill like that and all. Don't want to hurt another brother not by my hands."  
You look at him before diving forward and covering his tobacco packet with your blazer.   
"Teacher," you hiss, and he laughs.   
"You do motherfucking care."  
"Great, now I'm going to stink of smoke all day, and I'll have to prove to Dad I haven't started smoking. Again. Fuck you Gamzee, you ruined my day."  
He nods thoughtfully. "Y'know, I heard there was a guy who'd come up and sit with the smokers, but he wouldn't light his fag. Just stick this rolled paper all in his mouth, but not a single time did he motherfucking set it alight."  
"He sounds dumber than you."  
"If y'all say so."  
You sigh and sit back in the grass, staring at the distant school. Being in the country meant having massive playing fields, which of course the students abused to no end by doing exactly what they were doing now. The cold wind had chased the other smokers away, but Gamzee was always there and was never apparently affected by it.  
Then again, you muse, is he ever affected by anything?

As you walk back down, you hear a quiet cough over your shoulder.  
It's the girl in the blue beanie hat again, looking up at you with wide green eyes.  
You look at her expectantly.  
Did she want to apologise again? You'll tell her she doesn't need to.  
She opens her mouth to say something just as Gamzee gives her a languid grin and wave, and she snaps her mouth shut, looking almost fearfully at the two of you before scurrying off.  
"... well that was fucking weird," you say.  
Gamzee shrugs. "You never know which way someone'll motherfucking all up and turn when put under pressure." He rolls his tongue in his mouth thoughtfully. "Like a pressure cooker such as what my dad sometimes called himself. Everything's fine til it motherfucking ain't."  
You gaze after her retreating form and narrow your eyes. You didn't recognise her from your classes, although that wasn't hard when classes were segregated to how fucked up you were. She seemed relatively normal, but then you liked to think you were relatively normal, so that didn't mean much.

 

Your dad asks about your day over dinner, and you tell him it was just dandy, thanks for asking. He tells you off for being sarcastic. You promise not to do it again. He tells you off for lying.  
You end up slamming your plate down and storming out of the dining room, both of you screaming your heads off just like every meal time this week, and as you run up the stairs you wonder whether everyone fights like this.  
Whether it's just you who's the one who flies off the handle.  
Puberty is hard. It's hard and nobody understands, not even your father.  
Thank god it's Friday.

When you open up your laptop, you notice the ping of your other friends, your old ones, coming online to pesterchum. The ones that weren't salvageable even by "alternative" education.  
You accidentally hit caps lock at first. Yelling online is addictive, but your friends wouldn't thank you for it.

CG: SOLLUX?  
CG: I mean, uh, Sollux?  
TA: what a wonderful way to open a conversation, the capitalised yelling of my name screaming through cyberspace.  
TA: it just makes me so happy my friends know exactly how to behave in every social situation.  
CG: Excuse you assface, it's not like you're any better.  
TA: low blow KK, look at my ego stats fall.  
TA: falling, falling, and i just don't give a fuck.  
CG: Your defense was low and pitiful to begin with. You are a shitty leveller.  
TA: karkat why are you talking two me.  
CG: Two?  
TA: shut up.  
CG: I'm talking 'two' you, as opposed to 'three' or 'four' you because I'm wondering if you wanted to hang out this weekend.  
TA: huh. yeah i havent got anything planned.  
TA: i guess i can spare you a couple of days of my time.  
CG: Great. Exactly what I wasn't hoping for.  
TA: why are we even friends.  
TA: i mean, yeah of course we're friends and it would be stupid for us not to be friends.  
TA: but why.   
CG: Because neither of us have the social motivation or skills to get any new ones.  
TA: eheh speak for yourself, sucker. i have so many friends you dont even know.  
CG: So how come I've never met them.  
TA: well for one thing you never have any free time outside of that stupid special school.  
TA: and for two, every time i ever invite you any place so we can, you know, actually hang out like best friends are supposed to do, you always say you're grounded or busy or something.  
CG: I can't help being grounded. You know what my dad's like.  
TA: yeah yeah i know.   
TA: batshit insane.   
TA: so what are we doing tomorrow.


	4. Day Three - 10 Days to Incident

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> for some reason this chapter is incredibly glitchy. please bear with

_"The dead won't bother you, it's the living you have to worry about." - John Wayne Gacy_

You scowl out of the bus window and draw your bag close to you. Sollux lives deep in the city, a long bus or a longer train away from your home territory, although he'll never let you visit his flat and you've only met his parents a few times, and never together.  
The bus lumbers to a stop and luckily he's there waiting, but his eyes are missing their distinctive red and blue shades. They hang sunken and unseeing, the difference in colour of the pupils barely noticeable anymore for where one eye has turned a gunky black. The other is pearlescent, rheumy white.  
"Shit, Sollux." You frown when you get off and approach him. "What happened?"  
"Nice to see you too, bro. If I could. Which I can't." He sounds half irritated, half relieved.  
"Hilarious. But seriously - are you fully blind now?"  
"It's complicated. I'll tell you at the skatepark."

The skatepark used to be where you two would hang out back when things had seemed simpler. The problems were still there, but you just couldn't see them yet: the symptoms hadn't shown themselves, the disaster was dormant, bubbling below the surface. You sit on a ramp and watch the skaters grind like you once wished you could.  
"So if you're so blind, why are you walking all around the city by yourself?"  
He sighs. "Okay, so I'm not totally blind. I can still see, like, blurs and stuff out of this eye." He points to the white one. "The other one is totally dead, bro. They'd remove it but there's a load of shit going on there."  
You look at his black eye and can't help but shudder, seeing the whirls of mouldy blue faint in the membranes.  
"I thought your eyes were getting better."  
"Yeah you and me both." His foot bangs off the metal side of the ramp with a clang. "That was until Captain Crazy decided to give me a one way ticket to the A and E."  
"Fuck." He'd told you online all of the details about Ampora's psycho flip-out, and yes, you'd cried shameful guilty tears at the sheer shock of being afraid your friend wouldn't make it. But Sollux had made it, with a grim determination that put any Ishmael to shame, and you sometimes wished you had the pure steel strength of your best friend. "So he did this to your eyes, too."  
"Yeah, but they were fucked up anyway. And now I can traumatise small children."  
You nudge his side. "Okay, so at first glance your eyes seem vaguely terrifying. But actually, you have to admit they're pretty badass. You could totally pull of that monochromatic villain look. Like, Cruella DeVille or something."  
He snorts, shaking his head and not really laughing. "Glad you think so."  
There's so much more you wish you could say to him, but you can't find the words to form the shapes of your thoughts. You settle with cracking a couple jokes about how he should take Terezi to the cinema with him (he tells you he hasn't spoken to her for a long time, though she did help him when she found out he was going blind as well), and he actually gives you a crack of a smile, the ghost of an obnoxious laugh. With time, you believe it's fully possible you two could be just the same as you used to be, long ago.

It's just before you leave, when you're at the back of a long queue of people trying to catch the same bus, when a strange look comes across his face. He opens his mouth as if to say something, closes it. Then tries again and says;  
"KK, will you hold my hand."  
You blink at him, and he shrugs. "I know it sounds weird but just. You don't have to. Just hold it."  
"It's fine," you say, and reach out and take his hand where it tentatively hangs between you. His brow lightens a little.  
You're two boys at a bus stop in the fading city evening, solemnly holding hands. You would laugh, but it isn't that funny.  
"I mean, as long as... she doesn't mind..."  
"No." He smiles now, and it's almost the happiest yet. "I think Aradia would be okay with it."  
The queue starts moving again and you are pulled forwards by necessity, and his hand drops by his side.  
"Thanks," he says quietly, before louder, "dicksucking fuckwit."  
"You're welcome," you reply, "taint sniffing bagelface."  
"Bagelface??" he snorts incredulously, but you're paying the driver and sitting down and gone, back to your labyrinth of a suburb.  
He refused to let you walk him home, saying she guided him fine, and anyway, he still had one (kind of) usable eye, right?  
You worry, but you know he'll be okay.

Your dad bears down on you as you walk in, eyes hard set and there it is, the look that means you're in for a bollocking. The fuck did you do now?  
Or maybe not, because he pulls you into a hug.  
You tense up, you're already mad, why are you so angry? But he pulls back and the hard look in his eyes soften, just a little, and he says the unspoken mantra of "I'm proud of you," and you don't understand why that makes you sad.  
As soon as he loosens his grip, you abscond upstairs, barreling past your brother - on his way out again? - and once more you're on your laptop.

That night you drown your weird mood by reblogging shit on Chumblr.  
Unfortunately, your bad mood is only augmented by an anonymous hate message in your inbox.  
"YOu SMELL LIKE SHIT. AND YOuR BLOG SUCKS. I HOPE YOU GO FuCKING DIE SLOWLY AND PAINFuLLY. YOu SACK OF GARBAGE."  
That's it. That. Is It.  
"OK YOU BRAIN-TARDED ASSHOLE LISTEN THE FUCK UP. IF YOU WANT ME TO TAKE ANY KIND OF DAMAGE FROM THE PATHETIC ATTACK THAT IS THIS ANON HATE THEN YOU HAVE A LOT TO LEARN IN THE ART OF TROLLING, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO ACTUALLY SHOOTING YOURSELF IN THE HEAD AND LEAVING THE KEYBOARD SMASH FROM WHERE YOUR FOREHEAD HITS YOUR LAPTOP IN SOMEONE'S INBOX BECAUSE IF I HAVEN'T SAID SO BEFORE, THEN I'LL SAY IT AGAIN:  
HOW. FUCKING. /DARE YOU/ LEAVE DEATH THREATS ON OTHER PEOPLE'S BLOGS. WHERE THE HELL DO YOU THINK YOU GET OFF BEING SUCH A MISEDUCATED WORTHLESS PILE OF SHIT WHO HATES THEMSELVES SO BADLY THEY NEED TO MAKE THEMSELVES FEEL BETTER BY INSULTING OTHER PEOPLE? I CAN'T BELIEVE YOU ACTUALLY TOOK THE TIME OUT TO TYPE THIS INTO MY ASK BOX. WHAT THE HELL DO YOU THINK IS GOING TO HAPPEN?? THAT I'M GOING TO QUIT MY BLOG, CURL UP IN A CORNER AND GO AND DIE? NEWSFLASH DUMBDUMB, I DON'T CARE. I DON'T. FUCKING. ***CARE***.  
I DON'T VALUE THE OPINION OF ANYONE WHO'S SICKEST BURN IS "YOU SMELL LIKE SHIT". WOW, YOU WIN ALL THE AWARDS FOR BEST INSULT ON CHUMBLR. ALL OF THEM.  
MY BLOG SUCKS? DON'T FOLLOW ME.  
YOU HOPE I DIE? SENTIMENTS FUCKING RETURNED, WRAPPED UP NEATLY WITH A LITTLE BOW ON TOP.  
TL;DR YOU'RE AN IDIOT WHO CAN'T TYPE, AND I'M DONE WITH YOUR BULLSHIT."  
You hate anon.  
You hate the people who go on anon.  
You block them from your URL - carcinogeneticist - clicking the little block button in the corner, a recent addition by Chumblr that has improved your life greatly. Problem solved.  
You figure you can't take off anon altogether because heaven only knows you're just as intimidated by revealing your real url as everyone else is (plus a couple of your real life friends follow you and you're not comfortable with them being able to see all the really lame shipping questions you send to fandom blogs).

A couple of hours are spent persuing said fandom blogs, which focus mainly on that badass series "Ancestors". Originally released as a set of books, it soon was snapped up by some famous movie producer and turned into a glossy, epic 8 part film franchise.  
You miss the nostalgia of when it was just a small fandom who read it diligently, and shared obscure references in a small internet community.  
There's one blog you've followed since you first finished the books, and you would now consider a friend (on Chumblr at least). Their url is arseniccatnip and everything they post is gold.  
They share your otp (Sufferer/Disciple forever bitches), have clever and funny theories about the universe of "Ancestors", and to top it off they make amazing art. Ok, so their fanfiction isn't their strongest point but when you can draw like a prodigal Da Vinci, who cares about writing?  
When you look back at your inbox, you allow yourself a small smile as you notice they sent you a message.  
"hiya :33 want to rp? if you're not too busy that is"  
When talking to her, you've picked up the habit of talking in all caps, something inspired by the Ancestors books and how each character talks differently. She calls it a quirk. You call it cathartic.  
"YEAH OK." You reply. "PESTERCHUM?"  
You wait a couple minutes for her to reply, but instead she responds by signing in to Pesterchum. You swapped chumhandles a while back. They're the same as your URLs.  
"OK SO. THE USUAL DEAL?" you send, a little sheepishly. You still are a little uncomfortable admitting you actually roleplay, considering it's a bit weird and embarrassing and god help you if your friends ever found out.  
":33 < sure!!! ill start!"

AC: :33 < *the mysterious hooded woman runs down the street quickly*  
AC: :33 < *she looks left and right befurr darting down an alleyway clutching a bundle in her paws*  
AC: :33 < ((oops i meant *hands* sorry! too much furry rping heheh))  
CG: *A SIMILARLY HOODED MAN RUNS IN THE OPPOSITE DIRECTION BEING CHASED BY A FUCK TON OF GUARDS*  
CG: *HE COLLIDES WITH THE WOMAN*  
AC: :33 < *the woman quickly judges the situation and decides to help the mysterious stranger who has knocked the bundle out of her hands*  
AC: :33 < *she looks at the mean burly guards chasing after him and gets into a furrocious stance*  
AC: :33 < if you want him you'll have to get through me *she growls loudly*  
CG: *THE MAN IS A LITTLE WORRIED AT HOW READILY THE WOMAN DECIDED TO TRUST HIM, BUT DECIDES NOT TO LOOK A GIFT HORSE IN THE MOUTH AND ABSCONDS UP A NEARBY DRAINPIPE*  
AC: :33 < ((cg!!! youre not even going to fight??))  
CG: [[WELL HE WAS A FUCKING PACIFIST WASN'T HE. WHAT DO YOU EXPECT ME TO DO, QUOTE SOCIAL JUSTICE AT THEM UNTIL THEY DECIDE TO KILL THEMSELVES VOLUNTARILY?]]  
AC: :33 < ((i guess youre right but it means ill have to hog the pov for ages!))  
CG: [[YOU'RE THE ONE WHO WROTE US INTO THIS GODDAMN ALLEY WAY BRAWL. YOU GET US OUT.]]  
AC: :33 < ((fine!!!!))  
AC: *the woman leaps into the air like a purrerful leopard and reveals a set of knives hidden under her robes*  
AC: :33 < *she whirls around leaving scratches in the furst guards face and stabbing another one right through the ribcage*  
AC: :33 < *she kills the last two silently ripping open their abdomens with surgical purrecision*  
CG: YOU ARE COMPLETELY TERRIFYING WHEN YOU FIGHTRP.  
AC: :33 < hush and get into character! X33  
CG: *THE MAN LOOKS DOWN IN AWE FROM HIS VANTAGE POINT ON SOMEONE'S ROOF*  
CG: *HE IS COMPLETELY BLOWN AWAY BY HOW VIOLENTLY THIS WHOLE SITUATION ESCALATED*  
AC: :33 < are you ok? *calls up the woman clambering easily up to where he is sitting*  
CG: I'M... I'M SAFE NOW, I GUESS, *HE SAYS SHAKILY*  
CG: I THOUGHT THEY WERE GOING TO CATCH ME THAT TIME BUT APPARENTLY NOT.  
AC: :33 < *she grins at him toothily* i hate the guard! always chasing and fighting and taking money from the poor! anyone who is wanted by the guard is obviously a person of interest!  
CG: WANTED BY THE GUARD? YOU COULD SAY THAT...  
AC: :33 < what efur do you mean?  
CG: MY NAME IS... MY NAME IS NOT IMPORTANT. *HE HIDES BEHIND HIS HOOD NERVOUSLY, A SHADOW OBSCURING HIS FACE*  
CG: *EVEN THOUGH THEY'RE IN THE MIDDLE OF A FUCKING ROOF WHERE IT'S HARD TO FIND SHADOWS SO HIGH UP.*  
AC: :33 < cg are you even trying??  
CG: I GUESS I'M NOT IN THE RIGHT MOOD TODAY.  
AC: :33 < what happened? :((  
CG: ... I DUNNO.  
CG: I'VE JUST BEEN FEELING REALLY DOWN AND TENSE LATELY.  
CG: LIKE THERE'S A BIG CLOUD OFUR MY HEAD THAT I CAN'T SEE BUT I KNOW IT'S THERE.  
CG: *OVER, I MEAN. FUCK.  
AC: :33 < awww... tell me about it?

So you do. You tell them about how awful school is, and how hard it is having to constantly be on guard against dickheads who want to make your life hell. How wearing it is to constantly have to hide your real personality, and to have no one to share your interests. You say, in fact, what the school councellors wanted from you all along.

CG: I MEAN, FOR EXAMPLE, I HAVEN'T FOUND A SINGLE PERSON WHO LIKES ANCESTORS. NOT ONE. OK WELL THERE'S THIS ONE GIRL BUT SHE'S A COMPLETE BITCH AND SHE JUST SEXY ROLEPLAYS SPINNERET MINDFANG CONSTANTLY.  
AC: :33 < don't worry i understand  
AC: :33 < nobody at my school likes it either but it's ok  
AC: :33 < i enjoy talking with you about it!!  
CG: YEAH, WE DO TALK ABOUT IT A LOT TO EACH OTHER DON'T WE?  
AC: :33 < cg i think i should like it if  
AC: :33 < we gave each ofur our real names

You pause, heartrate increasing slightly. You're not sure about this, mainly because your name is fucking stupid but also because you're a little scared of what might happen. You don't even know if AC is a girl or a boy yet, although you'd bet girl because of how much they rp the Disciple.  
Also, you still have no proof that this person isn't a sixty nine year old pedophile who is skilled at running a blog.

AC: :33 < i mean if you don't want to then that's ok we could give each other clues and try to work it out  
AC: :33 < or we could just keep on calling each other by our handles that's ok too  
CG: MY NAME STARTS WITH K.  
AC: :33 < :DD my name starts with n!  
CG: HMMM. NATASHA?  
AC: :33 < nope!!  
AC: :33 < i'm named after part of my handle...

arsenicCatnip?

CG: IS YOUR NAME CATNIP?  
AC: :33 < no!!! h33h33h33  
AC: :33 < what about you?? you need to give me a clue as well!!!!  
CG: OK SO... I THINK SOMEONE ONCE CALLED ME "BEEP BEEP MEOW".  
AC: :00 < omgomgmog is it carkitty?  
AC: :33 < wait you said it begins with a k  
AC: :33 < karkitty??  
CG: ... NO, THAT'S NOT MY REAL NAME. MOSTLY. YOU'RE CLOSE THOUGH.  
AC: :33 < oh but that's so cute!!!!  
CG: I'M NOT FUCKING CUTE. I'M A SARCASTIC, SATIRICAL AND SELF LOATHING ASSHOLE. AT A PUSH, AN INSPIRATIONAL ASSHOLE.  
CG: BUT NOT CUTE.  
CG: OK YOUR TURN FOR A CLUE.  
AC: :33 < gosh i've given you the biggest clue already!!!!

You google arsenic. "Derived from the word zamikh-"

CG: IS YOUR NAME ZAMIKH?  
AC: :33 < you googled the wrong thing!!!!  
AC: :33 < oops i gotta go! my gym buddy is here!  
CG: YOU DO GYM??  
AC: :33 < hopefurry i can talk to you later!! :DD

You exit pesterchum with an unusual sense of warmth and companionship. God knows it's stupid when they probably live all the way in Portugal or something and you're never going to really meet them, but whoever they are - Catnip? Arsenic? Zamikh? - you count them as a friend now. A slightly silly, childish friend who likes to roleplay imaginary people and makes cat puns, who you would never introduce to your real life friends, but a friend anyway.  
You shut down your laptop and roll over in bed. You can hear your elder brother and your dad arguing in the kitchen.  
Probably wants a lift to another protest about animal rights or something. You stumbled across your brother's social justice blog once. You didn't understand half of it and it struck you as idiotic and batshit insane, with a lot of writing. A _lot_  of writing.  
You hear a door slam. Fucking Kankri. For all he talked about respect he never seemed to show any for you or Dad. You fall off your bed and look out the window in time to see a shock of candy red hair turn a corner and disappear. You wish he wouldn't make it even more noticable. You wish he could let people forget about this dumb genetic mutation, instead of buying bright red hair dye and making it worse. You dye your hair too.  
You dye it black.


	5. Day Four - 9 Days to Incident

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> finally, karkat and nepeta get a moment alone

_"Ye shall kindle no fire throughout your habitations upon the sabbath day." - **Exodus 35:3**_

You wake up on Sunday groggy and late. It's cloudy outside, a moody grey.   
A whole day of doing nothing.   
It sounds glorious.  
You head downstairs in a t-shirt and boxers ready to dose up on daytime tv and eat shitty cereal, quietly padding past your dad's room where you can hear violent snoring from.   
He works hard during the week.

You wonder what other people's Sundays are like a lot. Whether they're super religious and spend the whole day praying. Whether their mothers get up early to bake them pancakes and bacon and eggs and sing sickly sweet songs together. Whether they have crazy red haired older brothers who make them eat tofu bacon instead of normal bacon as well.  
Probably not.  
"Ah, Karkat. Good morning." Kankri smiles down at you and it's not what you want to see first thing on a Sunday.  
"Morning." You shuffle around him to get to the kitchen. He blocks your path.  
"Now I have a question for you that pertains to religion and faith and while I appreciate it's a little early for discussion, this concerns the rest of the day and therefore should be prioritised above breakfast, perhaps."  
God he can talk. You ignore him and grab a bowl and spoon when you can.  
"You see I notice that we call ourselves a protestant family but I cannot recall the last time we went to a church on Sunday."  
Maybe if you pretend he's not there, he'll go away. You pour the cereal, then the milk. Kankri watches you and makes a face, because he's the kind of person that pours milk first, and that says a lot to you.  
"As you can see, I am fully dressed and ready for the 11 am service... after you finish that cereal you can get dressed and accompany me."  
"Nope," you say though a mouthful of bran flakes, "nope no way. My plan for today is to do absolutely nada. No stuffy churches or boring sermons, not today."  
He frowns. "You're mistaken in believing you have a choice here, I'm afraid. The Lord never takes a day off so why should we-?"  
"Kankri, seriously." You shake your head at him. "We're not even that religious. I don't know why you're suddenly getting all pious on me when you've shown less than no interest before-"  
He actually holds a hand up into your face. "Let me just interrupt you there, before you continue on this vein of faith-shaming."  
"... Faith-shaming?!"  
"My observances of the Christian faith have been, so far, less than public and I had assumed you were pursuing the same privacy, but clearly I was wrong. You quite simply haven't been pursuing anything at all."  
"For God's sake-"  
"Karkat please, you of all people should know better than to take the Lord's name in vain-"  
"Gog's sake then! Whatever, I'm not doing it! I'm not going to church and neither is dad so don't go and wake him up."  
Your lazy Sunday morning is ruined and you storm out of the kitchen, half eaten leftovers slammed on the counter, and your brother's preaching still ringing down the hall behind you. A small part of you chides you for overreacting, and brings mental images of your brother's hurt face.  
A much larger part reminds you of the tofu bacon.  
It wasn't an overreaction.

As for waking your father up, it's too late. You hear a pained sort of grumbling and moaning coming from upstairs and the stomping of his footsteps. Great, now he'll be extra crabby all day. You scuttle into your bedroom and quickly shrug on some clothes, jeans and a thick sweater, and decide you're going out, even if the weather is threatening rain, even if you may as well have gone to church for all the rest you'll get. It had been bad enough when he'd tried to get you to turn vegan (hence the disgusting tofu bacon) but when he kept trying to get you to be someone you're not...  
You grab your phone and your bike and you're out.

The air is kind of misty and it gets you wet in a slow, incessant way - where you don't notice your clothes are sodden until you touch them with your hand and water drips down your fingers.  
When you ride fast, the mist hits your face and makes you blink. It's cold.   
The bleary fog of sleep is washed away slowly. Now where do you go? A flyby past the abandoned factory, with the Crocker sign half hanging off a rusty pole? The corner shops, to buy a better breakfast? You heard a rumour that the infamous substitute teacher Mr Egbert lives around here somewhere and you really don't want to run into your biology teacher today (what if he's buying his morning milk? The thought of meeting him, messy haired, bad mood, under the stark inescapable lights of a convenience store makes you shudder), so you decide to loop around the lake instead, which is a trek.  
But you've got all day.

Seeing the water get hit by the drizzle is surprisingly calming and you feel your mood lighten. You're slowly cycling down the mostly deserted towpath and you're pretty wet now, but it's nice. The grey lake shimmers with every raindrop and the overhanging trees shudder in the breeze. You wish you had an eye for art, but sadly you have no commendable means of recording the beauty you see in the drips from each leaf hitting other leaves with musical splashes.  
You're so intent on looking at the scenery you almost hit someone on the path.   
They shriek a little and your bike wobbles but a collision is avoided, and you brake hard and jump off to check they're okay.  
Plaintive olive eyes blink at you.  
You can't believe it's her _again._  
"Fuck, that was my fault. Sorry. Did I get you?"  
She actually squeaks and shakes her head quickly. "Mnmn." Wow, she seems really nervous considering you barely know each other. Maybe she thinks you did it on purpose oh fuck maybe she does.  
"It was completely an accident, believe me." You rub the back of your neck sheepishly. "I'm not usually that unobservant."  
"No it's okay!" she stammers at you. "I wasn't being very careful either, heh..."  
She has a strange accent, that purrs and rolls its Rs in a funny way, and her voice is pretty quiet and girly.   
"Yeah, look out for idiot cyclists perpetuating Darwinism in action - like me - in the future." You notice mud all over her hands and knees - everywhere, actually, even her perpetual blue beanie. Does she ever take it off? "Hey, did you have a fall or something? Do you need a tissue?"  
She glances down as if she forgot about the mess. "Oh! Oh, no, I didn't fall. This is just from climbing and stuff, it's pretty tricksty."  
"Climbing? " Who says tricksty?   
She grins. "Yeah! There's lots of great climbing places around here, and trees to hide things in and ropes to swing off! And swimming in the summer!"  
At first you were humouring her, but now you're more curious as to how someone could be so entertained in such a dull area. "Wait really?"  
She looks at you for a second as if sizing you up.   
"Come and see!" She blushes a little, but holds her head high, beckoning with a hopeful smile.  
You look down at your bike, before deciding, hey, why not?   
As you hide your bike under a bush, she disappears into the wet bracken, up the slope that leads away from the lakeside. You run to follow her, and quickly become aware that sneakers on wet leaves aren't the safest walking gear. But you're waist deep in soaked ferns now, green and brown and dragging at your clothes.   
She reappears just ahead and her smile is blinding. "Come on, quickly!"  
"Yeah okay hold on." You're making progress slowly; you get the feeling she lives in the woods and could outrun you by miles given the chance.   
Then the bracken clears away, and you're at the foot of a cliff of red sandstone, tree roots overhanging and pointing down at your face.  
The girl stands beside you, and looks to you as if for approval.   
"I didn't know we had cliffs here," you admit. She positively purrs.   
"There's caves all over, this side and the other one nearer the river. People used to live in them until really recently!" She's bouncing on her feet. "There's still some chairs and stuff they left behind but it's a bit rotten and old."  
You raise your eyebrows and look up at the cliffs, mildly impressed. "No shit. How did you discover all this?"  
"Easy... I went exploring!"  
You shiver suddenly and as interesting as abandoned cave houses are, you really feel the cold now - especially when a drip from a way above tree falls down the back of your neck and makes you yell.   
"Yeah, I might head back now, before my dad yells at me," you say gently, and she pouts. "I'm freezing and wet and stuff... but this was pretty interesting."   
"Ah, okay..." She seems a little sad. "Would you like to come see them again some time, when it doesn't rain?"  
"Sure." Empty promises made to humour her without hurting her feelings. "See you around or something." It's only a little white lie.  
She hums a goodbye and you navigate your own way back to the path, having to stop and disentangle ferns and weeds from your trousers several times.

The path back seems almost hopelessly mundane, suddenly, when the woods spit you back out.  
Your dad yells at you for being soaked when you get home.  
Your brother returns from church even more intolerably pious and self righteous than when he left.  
You realise you can't even remember the girl's name, if you ever knew it at all.

It's also Monday tomorrow.

**Author's Note:**

> if you see something problematic or just plain wrong don't hesitate to let me know so i can a) correct it and b) prevent myself from repeating mistakes.  
> this story is meant to focus on karkat and nepeta and please don't be put off by the somewhat dramatic beginning! this isn't going to be a horrible stressy murder fic, not the whole way through. there will be lots of fluuuuuuuufffffffff


End file.
